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July 24, 2014

Why dangerous dog laws should be influenced by experts, not journalists

Back in June, a woman and her dog were unfortunately attacked by an unconstrained dog in Wausau, WI. Her dog, a chihuahua, unfortunatelyl was killed in the attack.

Because the dog was classified as a "pit bull", hysteria of the moment set in and the woman requested that the city of Wausau consider banning pit bulls from the community.

Fortunately, Lisa Rasmussen, the chairwoman of the Wausau Public Health & Safety Committee said the city will not pursue breed-specific action.

Unfortunately, that hasn't kept Andy Davis of the Wausau Daily Herald from trying to stir the pot with a bit of made-up hysterics.

On Sunday, Davis wrote an article for the Herald entitled "Pit-bull bans controversial, but they work" in what appears to either be a failed attempt at journalism, or a successful attempt at stirring up controversy, attention and page views to the newspaper. But from a journalistic standpoint, the article completely fails at the ability to understand basic math, statistics, or honesty or integrity.

In the article, Davis compares Wausua (which has breed-neutral legislation) with neighboring communities such as Antigo and Greenwood -- which have bans on 'pit bulls'.

For both Antigo and Greenwood, both passed bans 20 years ago. In neither case was there any incident that sparked the ban, but both passed bans anyway. So, in the time they've had the ban they have gone from having no pit bull problem to continuing to have no pit bull problem.

But Davis says that the bans are successful because authorities in both communities say there have been no major incidents and thus, they feel the bans are working -- which compared to the one incident in Wausua, somehow makes Wausua's breed neutral approach (which is favored by all experts organizations) worse. Except, it's not.

There is one major thing that Davis completely failed to mention in his article: the size differential of the communities.

Greenwood: Population 1,000

Antigo: Population 8,000

Wausau: Population 39,000

Um, yeah, so based on size alone any type of incident is 4x more likely in Wausau than in the other two communities combined.

So, through the power of the interwebs, I filed a couple of freedom of Information Requests and gathered the following dog bite data for the three communities. Note that none of the communities track bite cases by severity. Over the past 18+ months (Jan 1, 2013 - July 23, 2014) here are the number of dog bites in each community:

Greenwood: 1 (so exactly 1 bite per 1,000 people in the community)

Antigo: 31 ( 3.9 bites per 1,000 people)

Wausau: 64 (1.6 bites per 1,000 people)

So if you look at the "success" of the Antigo ordinance, you'll note that you are 2.5x more likely to be bitten by a dog in Antigo (per capita) than you are in Wausau. This is Mr. Davis' success story?

And yes, while I agree there is a difference between a "Bite" and an "attack", it's worth noting that the vast majority of bites are quite minor, with less than 20% of them requiring any medical attention at all and less than 1% being anything that would qualify as even close to "severe". And severity is often a measure of the size (not breed) of the dog and the vulnerability of the victim -- whether that's an elderly adult, young child, or in Wausau's case, a tiny Chihuahua.

In this case it appears that Davis simply either ignored the actual statistics, and ignored the impact the dramatic community size difference would have in the likelihood of an attack, and tried to make a compelling story and headline to create controversy and sell newspapers.

Comments

Yet another case of journalistic malpractice to make trouble where none should exist. Years ago that kind of hysteria caused lawmakers to write feel good laws to make them think they were protecting the public. Good for Lisa Rasmussen and people with common sense.

A couple of years ago, my wife and I put in a "no skydiving" policy for our family. Nobody in our family was interested in skydiving in the first place, but ever since we've put in the policy nobody in our family has gone skydiving. So it's been a complete success.

Jamie, those folks can continue to insult and post misinformation, and the websites love the clicks and traffic, but a bunch of name-calling in comments of an article doesn't amount to much.

And in the real world of animal welfare and advocacy, these groups don't have much sway. They can continue to post whatever they want, while the good guys are out actually working with dogs and helping to evolve animal welfare. Would I rather be a) pointlessly arguing with some stranger on a website, or b) volunteering at my local shelter? I reckon I'll take option B.

We've just had a similar happening where I live with feral cats. One particular neighborhood has seen an increase in feral cats and wants someone to come on over and take care of the problem. The local news media picked up on it, interviewed some neighborhood man who spouted all the old wives tales about ferals (and there are many owned free roamers there) and now there are others who heard that who want their TNR'd ferals gone. The news piece was prejudiced from the opening - a photo of an angry hissing cat - and the negative tone was apparent through the entire piece. They never bothered to contact the rescue who is very involved with feral cat care and TNR to get accurate information. It has riled up a whole lot of folks! And the media could have done a good job of actually informing and educating people. Now cats will likely die because of it. The local ac traps and kills!

Brent, I hope you sent your article to the Wausau Daily Herald, with copies to Mr. Davis and to his editor (and maybe the publisher!). They likely don't have the stones to print something pointing out the fallacy in Davis' piece, but still, perhaps they might pause and think before they write/print something similar in the future.

You do a great job of shaming them on your Blog Brent.
It`s the nasty comments in response to the nasty articles that drive me crazy.
I need to just stop looking at them.
Time better spent with Fostering etc as Joel pointed out.

BSL has not stopped ONE bite or ONE dog related death but it has driven the breeds underground into the hands of the fighters and people who DO want to make them dangerous!. These laws should be influenced by a mix of vets and animal behaviorists. The rate of dog bites compared with vehicle related deaths and injuries is still miniscule. Every second somewhere in the world someone is killed or injured by a vehicle. Cars, Lorries, Mopeds, Motorbikes, even cycles, cause many more horrific injuries and deaths than dogs ever could. Yet I hear no talk about toughening up laws relating to alcohol levels for driving or other diving related laws or talking about banning vehicles!.

Truth is ANY dog can bite, any PET can bite, even a hamster can severely injure a child as when they bite, they don't let go either, I know from my own experience and still have the scar from a oh so cute Syrian hamster!. Hit a small child's artery with those teeth and that's a child bleeding out! could be just as fatal as a dog bite NO joke!

Better EDUCATION will help, in schools, even nurseries. Dogs known to be safe can be bought in leashed, someone can sit the children down in a circle and teach the children how to behave around the dog, what NEVER to do, and what TO do when around a dog, e.g never approach a stranger's dog without first asking your parent/guardian and the dog's owner if it is alright. Even I, at 28 always ask the owner if I can stroke their dog, it's common sense. Children are not stupid, and primary school age children learn very quickly.

Sites like familypaws can help too.

Spaying and neutering is NOT a bad thing, it prevents unwanted puppies and kittens in the case of cats. I got my cat neutered before I let him out so he could not father any unwanted kittens. If you Spay/Neuter you are HELPING animals to stay out of shelters and off death row.

I am hoping to get a staffy next year, I may be able to get him certified as a service dog as I am disabled, but I would also like to take him round hospitals and hospices, schools etc, bringing comfort to people and children in need of it. All he needs to do is be fully vaccinated and pass an obedience test, then I get a certificate and a permit which allows me to do this.